


Hollow

by hithelleth



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-05
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-05-05 03:08:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5358815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hithelleth/pseuds/hithelleth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>May we meet again.</i> He would pray, if there was anyone, anything to pray to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hollow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [angelette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelette/gifts).
  * Translation into Magyar available: [Üresség](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5383070) by [a walking Babel fish (angelette)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelette/pseuds/a%20walking%20Babel%20fish)



> I’ve never expected to write Bellarke (as you know writing for popular ships usually isn’t my thing, even if I ship them.) But, a week or so ago I logged in to LJ after a long time and saw your Yuletide wish list prompts. And it just so happened that that day I needed a break from other stories, so when I was trying to think of something else, this popped into my mind, basically writing itself (which is a small miracle of its own.) I know it’s early for Yuletide, but since tomorrow is St. Nicholas, this is my ‘St. Nick’s’ gift to you. :)

He hadn’t realised it would be like missing a limb. Like in those stories he had heard on the Ark long ago, of a person’s left hand trying to scratch the right one that is no longer there, of phantom pain where there used to be a body part.

There was a hollow at his side that his subconscious hadn’t grasped yet.

He would catch himself expecting a response, a sharp remark, an idea that would make him roll his eyes, a simple joke, a suggestion, anything, really, and starting to turn to his side in the middle of a conversation only to remember she wasn’t there. Then he would fake either stretching or checking the surroundings to cover up the lapse in his memory.

It was even worse when he was left to his own thoughts, going over the events of the day or one plan or the other, and all of a sudden his thoughts would run off and he would imagine telling her about it, curious about what she would say or expecting them to find a solution to the most recent problem together.

And then… Then the moment of realisation would come: he couldn’t do that because she wasn’t there. That was the moment when he could feel the awning void in his chest physically hurt, a sharp, stabbing pain that knocked out his breath.

If anyone had told him not even two months ago that he would find her absence almost unbearable, Bellamy would have laughed in their face and ask them to share with him whichever new kind of a brew Monty and Jasper had cooked up that they had got drunk on.

Somehow – in dire circumstances, Bellamy reminded himself – she had become an indispensable part of his life.

Annoying, spoiled, way too naïve and idealistic, she had represented everything he had hated on the Ark, everyone he had wanted to throw off their comfy pedestal and show them what justice looked like when the underdogs made the rules.

Showing the _princess_ who the boss was then should have been an easy job. To his surprise – no, shock – it had been all but.

The princess was made of sturdier stuff than he had reckoned: defiant, stubborn, challenging him, provoking him, driving him crazy. But, in a strange way, she complemented him. And if they had wanted to save all of the 100, they had to work together, so they did.

Their reluctant cooperation that had started as a matter of survival had turned into something resembling a well-oiled machine – albeit a weird one, maybe one assembled by an amateur, that would sometimes squeal and squeak and now and again one part of another would disconnect and it would need some repair, but most of the time it had worked, and worked well.

He had become used to having someone to bounce ideas off, someone to match him, to rein him in, someone to rely upon, someone who believed in him, made him want to be the best he could be, someone not afraid of him being the worst he was.

He would still call her _princess_ , a nickname he had given her to taunt her but that had become an endearment.

And now she was gone.

He supposed that when the Mountain Men had got her, between being captured, escaping, being imprisoned (again), and then fighting the Grounders, he hadn’t had the time to miss her.

Now, however, there was a lull in the struggle for survival, although he was sure it wouldn’t last for long. But, for the time being, both the Grounders and the Ark survivors were regrouping, licking their wounds and celebrating the recovery of what was left of their people from Mount Weather, momentarily forgetting the cost of the betrayal and the atrocities committed to achieve it. 

Now, there was plenty of time when his thoughts didn’t find any other occupation but were left to wander. They wandered into emptiness, and the person who usually managed to fill it wasn’t there.

He got it, though, why she had left.

What they had done in Mount Weather, it weighed on her.

It wasn’t that he was okay with it. Killing all those people… it was wrong. It was what at the given time they thought necessary to save _their_ people, but it wasn’t right. He didn’t like it, but he could live with it.

Clarke, she couldn’t. (He had offered her forgiveness. But that had not been his to give.)

Maybe it was because he just wasn’t that good of a man to begin with, because something in him was inherently dark, and despite everything that had happened since the landing, that same darkness hadn’t consumed her, not yet. (Not ever, he hoped, for her sake.)

Maybe it was because it was she who had given the order to irradiate Level 5. (He had placed his hand on top of hers when she had pulled the handle, wanting to stain his hands with his share of the blame for which there would be no absolution. The gesture had taken away none of her guilt. But then, he had known it wouldn’t.)

He could have kept her from leaving, talked her out of it, hell, dragged her into the camp by force. And then watch her being eaten up by guilt every time she looked at anyone and remembered what she had done. Watching her wither, hating herself, hating him… he wouldn’t be able to stand it.

So he had let her walk away, hoping she would find peace somewhere, hoping someday she would find a way back.

That was the other thing: he was worried for her.

Had she been the same princess as on day one, he would have had disproportionately greater reasons for worry. The fact that she wasn’t was what he reminded himself of to curb his worries.

She had learned a lot about how to survive since then, she knew how to defend herself, and if she couldn’t fight her way out of trouble, she could, in most cases, talk her way out of it.

As days passed and he was trying to adjust to the new reality without Clarke in the picture, that was what gave him reasons to hope.

_May we meet again._

He needed to believe that there would come a time when they would be together again. Co-workers, partners, friends, lovers. Any of those. (All of those.)

He would pray, if there was anyone, anything to pray to – maybe one of the ancient gods he had heard of, the tree, the Earth.

Instead, he thought at the stones he walked on, the trees he brushed past, the water running between his fingers, the wind that blew into his face – the elements of the same Earth she walked somewhere wherever she was.

_Let her return to me._

Because the world, the future without ever seeing her again were unfathomable.

**Author's Note:**

> What do you think? Good? Bad? Comments are always welcome.


End file.
